Focused and Fearless

Shaila Catherine

Focused and Fearless offers the richness of an ancient meditative tradition as interpreted through the practice of a contemporary American laywoman. This orientation represents a landmark shift in Theravadan Buddhism by bringing jhana into the reach of ordinary, busy practitioners.

Focused and Fearless speaks to ordinary meditators who wish to attain non-ordinary states with ease. It offers a creative and contemporary slant to this ancient path of happiness and wisdom. Blended with contemporary examples, pragmatic exercises, and âhow toâ instructions that anyone can try, this book provides a wealth of tools to cultivate non-distracted attention in daily life and retreat.

Focused and Fearless presents an accessible, friendly, and wise approach to establishing ecstatic meditative states that lead to liberating insight. This is more than a book about concentration. It offers a complete path for awakening that is firmly based on the power of a unified mind.

âFocused and Fearless is a beautifully written introduction to jhana meditation that demonstrates the importance and necessity of deep concentration. Without a concentrated mind one can not understand, by direct knowledge, the four noble truths.
The Buddha said Develop concentration. One who is concentrated understands things as they really are. And what does he understand as it really is? He understands as it really is:

This is the noble truth of suffering

This is the noble truth of the origin of suffering

This is the noble truth of the cessation of suffering

This is the noble truth of the path leading to the cessation of suffering.